According to Financial Times, the country intends to sell at least a quarter of the bank in June 2021. Islandsbanki was formed in 2008 from the domestic assets of Glitnir, one of the three large Icelandic banks that imploded in the financial crisis.
Iceland then recovered thanks to a boom in tourism, which was stifled first by the bankruptcy of local airline Wow Air in 2019 and then by the pandemic. As it is shown in Financial Times, an Iceland economist said the left-right coalition government seemed to be in a rush to sell Islandsbanki before the September polls.
It is said that Islandsbanki, whose common equity tier one ratio of 20.1% is high by European standards and above its own long-term target of more than 16%, wanted to return excess capital to shareholders.
The IPO will include a public offering to Icelandic retail and institutional investors and a private placement to some foreign shareholders with the shares to be listed on Nasdaq Iceland. Citigroup, Islandsbanki, and JPMorgan are joint global coordinators for the IPO.
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